Tied 2 Teaching STEM Activities, Full Year of Challenges with Close Reading Review

Tied 2 Teaching provides a great break from routine with their STEM Activities, Full Year of Challenges with Close Reading!  And sometimes I really need a break.

This is a bundle of amazing pdf downloads and there are so many activities to choose from.  Included for each month there are also several seasonal activities to choose from and there are enough activities to do one challenge every week for an entire year plus some!  These challenges are geared toward 3rd-6th graders.

The kids and I have had a lot of fun so far with the STEM activities we have completed at home.  Grant (age 2) had a lot of help but everyone else was able to participate on some level (age 5-15).   Every week I teach a Science class at our CoOp and I have been able to use a few of these activities with my CoOp students as well (average age 9/10).  Obviously, I cannot show you all the challenges so I will show you some of our favorites so far.

Design A Carrot Carriage - I did this one with the kids at home and with the kids in my CoOp class.

Miscellaneous Supplies

The kids designs

A's Carrot Carriage

 B building her carriage.

C's design

D's Carrot Carriage - she named her bunny peep King.

E's design

I was impressed with F, he went for a stretcher design.

G had help from A.

 And I made the Carriagenator 2000, notice the spoiler on the back.

 I added a rubber band seat belt for safety.

These were some of the designs created by my CoOp class!

Pencil Tower Challenge

Each challenge comes with numerous pages and handouts as well as examples of designs created by other students.  I personally didn't show my kids or my CoOp students these designs because I wanted to see what they would create but they were helpful for me to have if the kids needed guidance.

These were some of the designs created by my CoOp class.

I want to note here that the challenges can be adapted as needed.  I didn't have an unlimited supply of pencils so I asked my students to design a tower using pencils and masking tape that would support an apple (I changed it from tallest tower you can make).  Then, they wanted to see if they could create a tower that supported several apples.  You can see their creations in the collage above.

Love Bug Challenge

The reading for each design can be found on wonderopolis.  You can follow the link given or scan the QR code on the question and answer page.

Some of the reading for designing a love bug.

D and C's answer sheets for the love bug challenge text dependent questions.  You can see the QR code at the top right corner of their paper to get to the appropriate reading text.

Spaghetti Tower

These were some of the designs created by my CoOp class.

I love that these activities are an exciting way to learn and they are great for a wide age range.  They incorporate reading, writing, thinking and creating all in one.  They can be used to foster teamwork if kids work together and help boost confidence as students try new things.  You probably have a lot of the materials on hand around your home but I did have to purchase some depending on the specific challenge (especially for seasonal ones).

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The kids and I look forward to continuing on with our STEM activities throughout the year.  No more, "I'm bored" from my kiddos.